


la recherche du petit pain perdu

by aitoheiwa



Category: Oscar Wilde - The Importance of Being Earnest
Genre: Gen, M/M, Yuletide, challenge:Yuletide 2006, recipient:Peak in Darien
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-11
Updated: 2011-01-11
Packaged: 2017-10-14 16:35:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,166
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/151284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aitoheiwa/pseuds/aitoheiwa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Many thanks to fannore and princesslucia for the inspiration and playing sounding board.</p>
    </blockquote>





	la recherche du petit pain perdu

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to fannore and princesslucia for the inspiration and playing sounding board.

  


##  la recherche du petit pain perdu

  
Fandom: [Oscar Wilde - The Importance of Being Earnest](http://yuletidetreasure.org/get_fandom_quicksearch.cgi?Fandom=Oscar%20Wilde%20-%20The%20Importance%20of%20Being%20Earnest)  
Written for: Peak in Darien in the Yuletide 2006 Challenge  
by [ladybretagne](http://yuletidetreasure.org/cgi-bin/contact.cgi?filename=25/la)  


Many thanks to fannore and princesslucia for the inspiration and playing sounding board.

"Have you any idea what sort of things live in this water?" Jack couldn't help but pull a rather horrid face as the words left his mouth, a muffin poised in midair, one hand dangling perilously close to the edge of the punt as if he were debating whether or not to test the validity of his revulsion.

"Honestly my dear fellow, there is nothing worse residing in the Cherwell than the average occupant of the Savoy. It's not as if you're bathing in the Thames." Algernon shook his head in exasperation and continued to guide the punt amongst the crowded traffic at one of the more popular bends just past the Magdalene Bridge. "And if memory serves, far more palatable than the average resident of Balliol."

"Oh dear Lord, Algy. If you bring up that insipid rivalry one more time, I will be forced to cram this entirely unsuspecting muffin down your ungrateful throat." Once again, Jack was in high dudgeon, and Algy was entirely perplexed as to why. "I went to the trouble to hire this, no thanks to your sods at New College, and all I hear is slanderous caterwauling about Balliol."

The intricacies of college rivalries were suddenly forgotten as a pair of clearly too young women, one blonde and one redhead, dressed in their finest tweeds and clearly aiming to attract the attention of any eligible young men, succeeded in capturing far more than merely Algy's attention.

"Oh Lord, I am in love. Utterly and completely in love."

"With which one?" A reasonable enough question, but one greeted with extreme impatience.

"Oh with both of them, with either of them, who cares? They're divine and I'm in desperate need of at least one of them." The pole was suddenly thrust at Jack, the muffin basket snatched up, and Algy's weight hurled towards the stern of the punt.

"Oh Algy, now what do you need with the entire basket of muffins, honestly?"

There was a small group of ducks between Jack and Algy's current location and the object of Jack's sudden and passionate affections, and it became immediately apparent that Algy was convinced he had found the most expedient way to both remove the obstacles and endear himself to the pair of flushed, fair skinned girls. Groping for the muffin basket, Algy began to toss crumbs to the ducks, grinning wildly and clucking in the girls' direction rather more than the birds. Unfortunately for Jack's nerves as he awkwardly maneuvred the vessel towards Algy's targets, the show of avian affection was proving more popular than even Algy could have expected. A series of high pitched giggles and shrieks of glee came from the opposing punt, and just as Jack was reaching for the hand of his blonde darling, the pole snagged. In fact, not only did the pole snag, the entire punt engaged in a dreadful jarring motion, as did Algy. It was so very lucky that the obligingly deep water of the River Cherwell was there to catch his fall.

It was most assuredly an accident that the pole caught. Of course.

Or at least that was what Jack told himself, and Algy, as he enjoyed the sight of his sodden friend being helped back into their punt.

\----------------------

"Algy, I'm sunk!"

Jack threw himself onto the sofa as Algy stumbled into the room blearily, rubbing his eyes as he tightened the sash of his smoking jacket.

"Old chap, you know I adore you, but this is an obscene hour no matter what horrid fate has befallen you."

The ever fastidious butler Lane appeared and disappeared in a moment, depositing a plate of muffins on the table before he vanished seemingly into thin air. Algy gladly availed himself of muffins as he waited for Jack to find the strength to list his head from his hands and form complete words that would explain just what earth shattering tragedy had occurred to bring him to the Moncrieff Den of Iniquity at such an inhumane hour.

"It's Mabel. She..." His sentence was interrupted by an anguished wail and a hand blindly groping for a sustaining muffin, which he promptly stuffed into his mouth with much more force than was necessary. "She wants me to marry her! For God's sake, she's a dancer! Who marries a dancer?"

Wiping the crumbs of his third muffin from his silk lapels, Algy had no response at first but a knowing shake of the head. "She may be a dancer, but she is also a highly evolved predator, as I told you from the first."

Jack groaned pathetically, his head once again hiding itself almost of its own volition between his hands, his shoulders slumping resignedly. "I can't marry her, but what do I say to her? She's persistent! She's horrifically persistent!"

Algy gave his friend a knowing shake of the head and pressed a hand to his shoulder. "She's a dancer and she has far too nice a pair of breasts to ever be anyone's wife. Just avoid her, she'll forget the fancy and move on and you my dear will have a lovely mistress when the time comes."

Jack raised his head slowly, his eyes wide and far more confused than they should have been considering the number of times similar comments had left Algy's mouth in his hearing.

"Algy, you are truly not of this earth."

\-------------------------

"See now, I have butter on my cuffs, just as I said."

Jack rolled his eyes faintly and pressed his forehead to his palm more forecfully, as if the effort might rid Algy's presence and the lack of muffins from his consciousness, if only temporarily.

"It serves you right, eating all the muffins like that. Entirely heartless, I say once again. At a time like this, with my life absolutely hanging about my knees, you steal my only solace right out from under me."

"Your life is hanging about your knees? As if Cecily is any less important to me than Gwendolyn is to you?" Algy was reaching a state of near apoplexy that was unusual for him, even at such a dire moment.

"Algy, you and I both know that Cecily is a mere diversion for you, and I am within a moment of forbidding you from having anything to do with her!" That would show him. Jack was still her guardian, still had some control over the situation even if that horrific Lady Bracknell had him in an utter death grip over Gwendolyn.

"You know you won't do that." Algy suddenly seemed entirely calm as he tossed the last crumb of muffin into his mouth. "You wouldn't in a million lifetimes."

And the damnable thing was, he was right.

  
   
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